The disclosure relates generally to methods and apparatus for providing pixel information for display, and more particularly to methods and apparatus for displaying an image on a curved display.
Display images are made up of millions of tiny dots, where each dot is one of thousands or billions of colors. These dots are known as picture elements, or “pixels.” Each pixel has multiple attributes associated with it, including at least color data represented by a number of value(s), index or other representative pixel information stored in a computer system. A display image, although displayed using a two dimensional array of pixels, in fact is created by rendering of a plurality of image objects.
Graphics processors, such as GPUs or APUs, are used to display the image objects. A graphics processor typically receives image processing instructions and generates primitives that form the basis for a back-end's work. The back-end of the processor receives the primitives and performs the operations necessary to send the data to a frame buffer where it will eventually be rendered to a physical display. More complex structures, such as three dimensional objects, are formed from a combination or mesh of such primitives.
To display a particular scene on a display device having a two-dimensional screen, the visible primitives associated with the scene are drawn individually by determining those pixels that fall within the edges of the primitive, and obtaining the attributes of the primitive that correspond to each of those pixels. As an example, the obtained attributes are used to determine the displayed color or contrast values of applicable pixels.
However, the particular scene includes a predetermined number of pixels in a virtual rendering surface of a screen space having X (e.g., width) and Y (e.g., height) coordinates. A bounding box defined by minimum and maximum coordinates is created based on the screen space X and Y coordinates to limit the number of pixels displayed on a physical display screen of the display device. Rows and columns of the virtual rendering surface in the bounding box are typically mapped to corresponding rows and columns of the physical display screen for displaying the particular scene in the bounding box on the display device.
FIG. 1 illustrates conventional methods of mapping the virtual rendering surface to the physical display screen for display. In one example, for a flat display device 100, a viewing position 102 of a user is utilized to create a bounding box. Pixels on a virtual rendering surface 104 in the bounding box are respectively mapped to a physical display screen 106 using a constant scale ratio. In one example, each physical pixel of the physical display screen 106 is mapped to a constant number of virtual pixels on the virtual rendering surface 104. Similarly, in another example, for a curved display device 110, a viewing position 112 of the user is utilized to create a bounding box. Pixels on a virtual rendering surface 114 in the bounding box are respectively mapped to a physical display screen 116 in the constant scale ratio.
Conventional mapping methods shown in FIG. 1 employ the constant scale ratio between virtual pixels of the virtual rendering surface and corresponding physical pixels of the physical display screen. In this configuration, each physical pixel is mapped to a constant number of virtual pixels throughout the display device. However, it has been determined that when the physical pixels are displayed on the flat or curved display device 100, 110, an image content of the corresponding virtual rendering surface can be distorted. This distortion effect is, for example, commensurate with a degree of curvature of the curved display device 110. As such, the image content is increasingly distorted toward lateral side edges of the curved display device 110. Thus, a degraded image quality or appearance is provided to the user.
Accordingly, there exists a need for improved method and apparatus for displaying an image on a curved display in order to address one or more of the above-noted drawbacks.